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if you’ve been keeping up with the adventures of our little household, you know that my mum has been staying with us since about three weeks before phix was born. so, for as long as we’ve had a baby, we’ve had a ‘mamani’ in our house.

two hours ago she left to go back home to australia. and i have been a weepy mess ever since. if she was here, she would tell me to stop crying because she’d worry that it would affect my milk supply and that phix would sense my sadness and he’d have a difficult night’s sleep. because this is who my mama is. she is always thinking of others.

while she’s been here i’ve had the chance to observe her closely. after all, i’m learning to be a mama, so it’s like i’ve gotten to ‘job shadow’ someone who is pretty well-versed in this role. and to this day, i am still in awe of the way she interacts with the world, the relationships she fosters with friends with strangers alike, and her uncanny ability to see the beauty in every.little.thing. (i always tease her about how she smuggles rocks, shells, and plants from country to country. only my mama would see an entire universe in a pebble.)

my mum constantly strives to make other people’s lives a bit brighter. within days of her moving in she had planted flowers in our backyard, along with a little herb garden and tomato plants. she took pancakes over to our lonely neighbor, fixed all of dev’s favorite shirts that had worn thin and made a hammock for phoenix in our backyard. each morning, she would come into our bedroom and whisk phix away on a long walk so he could see “the doggies” just so dev and i could catch up on sleep for another two hours each morning. she made us every meal and quietly took note of all our likes and dislikes (extra brussels sprouts for me, none for dev), did all the dishes in our dishwasher-less house, took care of all the laundry and not one time did she make us feel like ANY of this was a burden. in fact, just the opposite, she makes it so clear that her happiness comes from taking care of those around her. chances are, that if you stepped inside our home in the past three months my mother will have called you darling, and tried to feed you.

here’s just the tiniest example of how my mum operates. every tuesday evening an elderly man walks up and down our street and goes through all the recycling bins looking for bottles. he wears gloves, but obviously it’s a dirty task. i imagine he is collecting these to take them to a recycling station and get the 5c returns on each one. after watching him do this one week, mamani decided she would separate out our bottles from the rest of our recycling so he didn’t have to forage through our bin (she sees such dignity and nobility in every.single.person). not only did she put all the bottles in a separate clean bag, but she waited for the man the following week, went outside to greet him and handed him the bag of bottles she’d collected. as you can imagine, his entire face lit up and he was so thankful. and so, this became their weekly routine…and of course, something that we need to continue.

mamani wove herself effortlessly into the fabric of our everyday-lives. as dev said tonight, “phoenix has never known this world without his mamani” and i’m so, so grateful that we all had this time together.

there are moments when i’m really scared about being a good mama, but i know i have been given the best example first hand.

2 comments on “mamani.”

I absolutely loved this post, and I’m so glad to finally *meet* your mum – she sounds like a Saint, and reminds me of my mum also who constantly washes our baby’s clothes by hand and never complains. I think she partly enjoys it because my husband and I are moving from Scotland back to his native Kiwi land in 3 short months, and she wants to make the most of doing anything to do with having Daisy-Ann in her life.
I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like when we immigrate, but I know somehow that I’ll get strength from my husband and other family and friends, but ultimately the strength comes from God who always keeps us in the palm of His hand x

This post almost made me cry, because I’m also leaving very far from my Mom and Dad. Sometimes I feel that its so wrong to leave far from your parents, I feel like something is missing in my life. I live in LA too and my parents live in Moscow, Russia. My dream is to buy a big house here so that we could all leave together!)